Harriet Lillian Potter was exhausted, the kind of tired that would settle into your bones like lead and set up shop there for days to come. Apparating to America had taken it out of her, but it was the hour long briefing she had to sit through before her apparition from good old England that truly dug the dagger home.

Harriet, or plain old Harry as she preferred, worked for the department of magical law enforcement in the ministry, or more widely known, she was an Auror. The department itself was fissured into five major sectors. Division one handled the serious criminals, the insane bastards that went on murder sprees. Division two took care of the everyday mundane criminals, ranging from prank spells gone too far to would be Gringotts robbers. Division three listened to petty disputes over heir looms or anything else the magical community was squabbling over at the time. Division four sat for hours on end being the ministry's desk monkeys, filling out legislation like apparition licenses, broom licenses or the Wizengamot documents.

Finally, there was division five, who Harry had joined straight after her Auror training at the tender age of nineteen. The division P.A.W, aka the Protection And Welfare of magical creatures, was relatively small compared to the other departments, only in the last five years having been built into existence. At the time, when she had finally gotten her hands on her acceptance letter standing in the kitchen of Grimmauld place barefoot and pyjama clad, everyone had been shocked at her choice.

It was no secret she was a shoe in for division one, everyone expected her to take up that mantle, she had been baring that burden since she was eleven after all. So coloured them surprised, Weasleys included, when she had went to the burrow to give the good news. She really couldn't blame them, she too during her training had thought division one was a sure thing.

Who wouldn't? The chosen one carrying on the good fight for the safety of the little children tucked into their warm beds by smiling parents, it sounded like the perfect ending to a children's novel. Life however was nothing remotely as just or kind. No one ever spoke about the troubles of the heroine or hero after the credits rolled. They never saw the castle crumble or the roses wilt. The real endings were never happy enough for the general public to be able to swallow, so they would always make up their own endings. Harry knew this above all else.

The fact of the matter was Harry was tired of playing the role of the selfless heroine. Selfless heroes lost everything in the end, that's what the story books left out. She herself had given up too much already for people who wouldn't even give a second glance her way if they saw her bleeding to death in Knockturn alley.

Sirius, her parents, Remus, a safe and loving home, her god damned childhood. All gone like dust in the wind on the whims and wills of others older and more cunning then herself. Even the sanctity of her soul, her very core had been tarnished by being a Horcrux. There was some things you could never wash off, never bury deep enough. Having a shard of a mad man's soul lodged in your own soul, whispering poison in your ear was one of them. She was done, finished with giving up things for people who had no right in asking her to in the first place.

But atlas, as far as she had come from her sacrificial lamb days, she couldn't completely turn off her ability to care. She had a hero complex, one ingrained in her since pre-pubescence thanks to almighty Dumbledore. At twenty two, she was a big enough girl to admit it, even if it was only to herself.

So hunting down rogue creatures, preventing muggle exposure, and helping the spare few who deserved it was enough crumbs to feed her hero complex, but to simultaneously keep herself out of the direct line of fire that division one would have thrown her head first into.

Of course she should have known the universe would have the last laugh, it always did when it came to her. So after years of training, of being the trainee in the office were the big boys liked to play pointless pranks and filling out others case files while they went out drinking, when her very own first assignment had come slamming its way onto her desk in a thick wad of parchment, she shouldn't have been all that shocked at how things had gone down hill from there.

The assignment was vague at best, inauspicious at worst. The A.U.P.C, the American Union and the Protection of Creatures had called out for help from its over the pond cousin. Unusual? No, both the English and American magical ministries interlocked and wove together on more than a handful of occasions. What was bizarre was the lack of details present in such a long winded file.

There was one witness, who had not spoken to a single person yet. No picture of the creature, no name or species specified. All the thirty-two pages gave away could be fit onto two lines, the town that Harry would have to travel to, the witness's name, address and the date she would meet said witness. And finally the estimation of the duration of her stay in America. Which was considerably long due to the amount of facts she would have to dig out herself.

What really sent Harry's alarm bells ringing was there was no mention, none what-so-ever of what had tipped the A.U.P.C onto the case. No turn of events listed that should warrant an investigation, not even a suspected cause. Nothing. Nada. Silch. Jack fucking all.

She had to take it however, it was her first case, she couldn't be picky until she found her feet on more even ground, until she had a few solved cases under her belt. One trip or failing and she would be sent careening out of division five with the door slamming behind her forever.

It looked like Harry would have to face this blind, but that wouldn't be a first either. So like the good little Auror she wanted to portray to the world, she packed up only what she would need and left for a town called Hells kitchen of all names. With a few warm but brief goodbyes to the few who truly mattered to her, Hermione, Ron and the Weasleys, a pathetically short list in reality, Harry found her feet pounding on foreign soil.

Her first thought of the apartment the American ministry had set up for her was one of relief. Sure, it was no Hogwarts or Grimmauld place, but she had rested her head in worse places. The tent from when she was on the run and the Dursley's cupboard being but two she could name off the top of her head. The apartment building was rough around the edges, situated in a dubious neighbourhood, bit it held an odd beauty in an industrial way... And if Harry took her glasses off while she looked at it.

Sighing and glancing down, her small suitcase perched at her feet, Harry took one last glance to her apartment key that had come along with the file, memorized the number printed in black bold letters on a key chain and proceeded to shoulder the heavy metal and glass double doors open.

The lobby was deserted, but thankfully at the other end of the hollowed room was an lift. The wheels of her suitcase squeaked and squawked their protest obnoxiously on the linoleum flooring as she dragged it across the room and towards the lift, the noise grating on her ear drums considerately. The fluorescent light above her head flickered as she passed under it.

If you knew the right signs to look for, spotting a witch or wizard was not a hard task to complete. Malfunction of electronics in proximity of a witch or wizard being one of those hidden jewels to look for. The problem for inquisitive muggles, but the saving grace of the wizarding world was to know the hints, was you had to already know about their kind, excluding the illegal act of telling a muggle about their world. But to find out about Harry's kind, you had to read the riddles laid bare before you. The one thing that was stopping the two societies, two abundantly different worlds they walked in from colliding irrevocably was a simple but irrefutable paradox. Mother nature had one nasty sense of humour.

Edging into the lift with sluggish limbs, jerking her suitcase in from behind her, Harry turned around and smashed her floors number into the control panel. The sooner she got settled in, the sooner she could get some shut eye and the sooner she could finish this case.

Who knows what this nameless and faceless person had been through, or had put other people through. The sooner he/she was in safety, or more than likely arrested, the sooner Harry got to drag her arse back home. Whatever this person did or did not do, it was enough to catch the gaze of the A.U.P.C, big enough for them to go gunning for one single person. Normally this type of response, undercover recon and quick actions was only left for the bigger things, like an Inferi outbreak or the new settlement of a werewolf pack.

This only made Harry more tired and anxious to get stuck in and get it over with. She needed to pursue this with extreme caution. Not only had the ministry thrown her into the deep end blind on her first swim, the bastards had thrown her into the whirlpool tank with a bloody shark in it. Trust the ministry to try and fuck her over one last time, just for good measure. This was payback for her hand in the destruction of the ministries opulent head office in her fifth year, she was of it.

The muted swooshing of the lift doors opening brought Harry out of her pessimistic thoughts. Straightening herself out, Harry left the slightly claustrophobic lift and entered the narrow but long hallway that led to her apartment. With a harsh tug of her arm, her suitcase sprang free from its snag on the lifts doorway. When the case was free Harry finally looked up and out into the hallway, her steps faltering at the scene playing out before her.

Three muggles, a man and two women were crowded around each other. One woman, with hair a shade lighter than Harry's own raven locks was standing bathed in yellow light from the bare bulbs above, arms tensed and crossed over her leather clad chest, foot tapping away impatiently on the sticky floor. A frown was puckered between her arched brows, the flush of anger blossoming on cheeks. Harry couldn't blame the woman, she would be pissed too if she had a livid red haired, half dressed woman getting in her face like that, a willowy finger jabbing closer and closer to the brunettes face with every passing second. The man was doing nothing, a bystander by all looks of it, if it wasn't for his own flushed and worried face and twiddling of his fingers, a nervous habit Harry guessed, giving his participation away.

Now, Harry wouldn't normally get involved. She would have normally lowered her head and walked right passed the arguing muggles. But of course, with the day she was having, they had to be warring outside her flaky painted apartments door. Because them being anywhere else, preferably far away from Harry with the mood she was in would be too much to ask for. At that one moment, Harry had half the mind to floo call both ministries and tell them to go fuck themselves. Thankfully, sanity won out.

Huffing to herself in exasperation, Harry made her way over to the the small group and tried to inconspicuously scuttle around them to get to her apartment. That was futile Harry realized when she got close enough, the two red heads were barring her door rather well. Dropping her suitcase with a loud thud to the floor, Harry spoke up, seeing no other option.

"Excuse me."

The brunette woman and the ginger man simply flickered their gaze her way, however the ginger woman twirled in a flutter of her beaded top, body tensing as if she was ready to ponce on Harry in a moments notice.

"You're excused. Now go away."

The words were pressed out of the red haired woman's bared teeth, and as quickly as she had took notice of Harry, she had equally turned back around to the brunette woman, carrying on her tirade accompanied with eccentric hand gestures. Harry had to clench her right hand and bite the inside of her cheek to stop herself from sending a stinging hex towards the rude woman. Breathing through her nose, in hopes of centring herself, Harry gave it one more try.

"No really, excuse me. You're standing in front of my door and I want to get past."

The angry woman huffed loudly and snapped back to Harry's direction, looking non too pleased at being interrupted again. Harry couldn't care less, the whole woman, from her panties and beaded shirt, to her glittering scarf she was using as a headband rubbed Harry the wrong way from the get go. Add in her obnoxious and rude behaviour, well if the red head wasn't careful, Harry would just give up and whip her wand out. After all, there was always the option of obliviate.

"Can't you see I'm in the middle of something? So take your little self and accent and-"

"If I were you I would not finish that sentence. Ever. I have been having a bloody day and a half, so this will be the last time I ask nicely. Move or I'll move you myself."

The red haired woman's lips thinned, almost as sharp as a blade, and curled up at one corner. She looked ready to explode, and Harry was almost welcoming it, to get some of the built up tension and anger out at something, anyone, when Harry made the mistake of glancing towards the man. Obviously red and crazy didn't like her looking at him, as she jumped forward and got close to Harry's face.

"I get it, you want him too don't you? Well get you grimy eyes off him, he's mine!"

Harry put her loss of control on her emotions down to her tiredness, the fact she was stuck in a country where she knew no one and the red head in her face, but the results of her loss of control was evident enough when one of the dangling bulbs of lights a few feet away from them shattered into a glittering shower of broken glass. Thankfully it gave the group Harry had found herself with a distraction, long enough of one for Harry to regain the hold on her magic and her emotions.

The brunette only stared for a moment, but the ginger woman scampered closer to the man, practically bending herself around him. If possible, Harry would have thought the woman would have jumped into his skin.

"This isn't finished Jessica, stay away from him. And you too Snow White. I'll know if you don't."

Then the two red heads were off down the hallway in the opposite direction of the broken light, huddling into an ajar apartment door and slamming it behind them, leaving Harry and the brunette in their wake.

"What the hell is that woman's issue?"

Harry hadn't meant to have spoken, it just seemed to slip out from her lips. Five minutes in America and she had already ran into a crazy, so was the way of her luck. What was next? Werewolves? Cornish Pixies? Harry sent up a silent prayer for no Inferi. Ever since getting the locket Horcrux with Dumbledore, watching as those... Things crawled out of the water after them, Harry had grown a slight fear of them, and a more than slight fear of drowning.

"Don't worry about Robyn. You live here and have a pair of tits, she's got it out for you. But she's harmless enough."

"Well... Fuck."

The brunette, Jessica according to the woman, who she now knew was called Robyn, was already partially turned away from her. Jessica's defensive posture was down slightly, her arms now being down her side rather than across her chest, but Harry could tell by the hard sheen in her eyes that her guard wasn't fully down. Then Jessica was looking at her quizzically.

"What's your name anyway? Not many people move in here."

The hard look in her eyes had grown into a full blown brick wall before Harry could blink. The amount of time it took for Jessica to go from distant to interrogatory was almost jarring, if Harry hadn't have known men like Mad-eye Moody. But she had, and she knew a battle scarred person when she saw one. Harry was one herself, she saw it in the mirror every time she could bring herself to look. But the question was why this seemingly normal woman would hold such a look herself. It wasn't a common occurrence. Harry decided to play it safe, no need to arouse suspicion before the first day had even ended after all.

"Harry potter. You?"

Jessica's chin rose up a little at Harry's answer, meaning as she was slightly taller than Harry anyway, Jessica had to look down at her. No matter if the action was sub-conscious or accidental, Harry despised being looked down on. She had to put up with that her whole life, she wouldn't take it from complete strangers.

"Harry? Isn't that a guys name?"

Harry eyed the brunette up and down, not quite sure what the muggles angle was. Was she being condescending? Was it just an innocent question? But there was no smirk that normally accompanied peoples jests and jabs at her name, so Harry believed it was the latter. Innocent until proven guilty and all that inane justice quotes people sprouted as if they knew anything about true justice. Harry was more of a fuck 'em all until they proved useful type of girl.

"Short for Harriet."

"Ah, well my names Jessica Jones, I live just a few doors down from you. Need anything, come and get me."

Then Jessica was turning on the ball of her boot encased feet and was marching down the hallway without so much of a goodbye, and finally Harry thought she had figured out what the muggles hook was. Socially awkward. Or at the least socially anxious. In that respect, Harry could more than sympathize with her.

Now Harry had two options. Option one, head into her apart and push this whole encounter into the back of her mind. Or option two, follow Jessica and try and strike up a conversation with the woman. Which with the task Harry was on would be more than useful, because in facing the facts, Harry knew near to nothing about America, let alone this town in the middle of nowhere.

This woman was obviously a local, she would know the layout of the town, know which places to go for what occasion, she would know the ins and outs of town and most importantly, she could possible know of something strange that had happened here, the thing that had tweaked the A.U.P.C in the first place. Something that would give Harry a direction to hunt in. And if it turned out Jessica knew nothing, then making a possibly alley, or dare she say it friend, couldn't hurt surely?

So, Harry quickly unlocked her apartment door, dumped her suitcase in the black depths of the room, and locked up just as fast as she had opened it. When she started following Jessica down the hallway, Harry noticed how fast the woman had clocked on to being followed, too fast for a normal every day Joe to do so.

Jessica carried on walking down the hall, but span her head around to face her even though her steps carried on their echoing movement. One eyebrow was raised high on her head in silent question, and Harry grinned at the woman.

"What? You said if I need anything to come to you. You look like you have a good stash of alcohol hidden away and I REALLY need a drink."

Harry almost sighed in relief when Jessica didn't take it the wrong way, instead for her efforts, Harry had gotten a half smile, measly but from the type of woman Harry guessed she was dealing with, it was a mile stone. Even small steps were progress after all.

"I think we're going to get along just fine."

Harry only grinned wider at Jessica in affirmation. Then when they came to the end of the hallway, Harry saw Jessica come to a stop at a door. Not worrying really, apart from the glass pane in the middle had been smashed to smithereens. The remnants of the pane still littering the floor around Jessica's door haphazardly. Now it was time for Harry's eyebrow to make an ascent.

"How'd your door get so busted in?"

Jessica's half life smile became a fully fledge grin, and despite Harry originally wanting to make the woman smile, she couldn't help but find the gesture almost ominous now as she was faced with it. Jessica's next words didn't help calm Harry any more than her smile did.

"Welcome to Hells Kitchen Harry."

A.N- I have no idea how this fic is going to go down with readers. I did do a poll, for the ones who read my other stories, of which character pairings people would like to see, and Hermione/Kilgrave won out. But as you see, I changed Hermione to a genderswaped Harry.

Why? Because I can and to be perfectly honest, it just sort of happened while I started writing. Plus, I just see Harry blending into the Jessica Jones universe better than Hermione would, and the genderswap was for fun. XD

On to the most important thing. WARNING for those of you who are sensitive, or find Kilgrave triggering DO NOT READ THIS FIC. Take this as fair warning. Kilgrave is his own walking trigger, so just keep that in mind. And before anyone continues on reading this story and then starts reviewing or me about how Kilgrave is such a horrible character, how I'm a rape apologist or any other nonsense, I have one thing to stay before you do.

Don't waist your time. The reason I like Kilgrave as a fictional character is because of how twisted he is. Does that mean I condone anything he has done? No, but he is a FICTIONAL character, and to be honest, I'm fed up of people trying to stick solutions to real world issues onto fictional characters. Of course fictional worlds and characters are a great option of fleshing out real situations and actions, to explore certain aspects of humanity, even those we would rather not acknowledge. But If you really want to do something about these horrible real world situations, instead of sitting at your computer and writing accusatory emails or rants, go out and volunteer at a women's shelter, donate money to a charity that does the great work, do something positive instead of pointlessly negative things. Ragging on some ones fanfic of all things isn't going to change anything in the real world, it's just not how things work. So do something positive!

The thing many people are simply not getting, is if we stop talking about characters like Kilgrave, his influences or the things that drive him, then we will start to hush up on the real topic here. Talking, in any form, is a way to spread awareness, to open peoples eyes.

And as a writer, a person who likes the darker aspects of fictional worlds and people, I will not let someone stifle my creativeness or stop me from doing something I enjoy doing in my spare time for fun. Criticism is fine, actually great, but down right flaming for a choice of including a certain character is not. So you have your warning, this is obviously going to be a dark fic, so turn back while you still can.

I'm sorry for the awfully long winded rant, I just wanted it out there before the real story starts. Hopefully this will be the only rant attached to this story.

AS FOR MY OTHER FICS: I can't decide will be updated soon, I promise and as the poll is finished, I can say that the three that won out is obviously the Kilgrave one, then Matt Murdock/ Hermione which will be out around saturday/Sunday and the Ragnar/Hermione one, which will be out Tuesday, Wednesday latest.

As for people who actually like the weird turns my brain sometimes take, thank you for reading and if anyone has a spare moment or two, a review would be great. ;)